‘Money for nothing’ or low self-esteem – why are more young people on sickness benefit?

Standing with a group of friends in the market square in Romford, Jordan reveals he’s been signed off work for the last four years due to mental ill health.

At 23, he’s one of a growing number of young people in Britain living on sickness benefits.

Latest figures revealed there are almost a million people aged 16-24 who are not in education, employment or training. That’s one in every eight young people.

Jordan says he has applied for jobs but believes the welfare system “incentivises people to sit at home really and just not look for a job”.

He knows if he got a job he’d lose his benefits. That’s why he thinks many his age give up trying.

“The way that some people see it is that you’re just going to be getting money from the government for literally nothing,” he says.

Olivia Delve is also 23 and, like Jordan, has been out of work for four years due to anxiety and depression.

At 19, she left a job in healthcare because she became pregnant just as the pandemic hit.

She’s now getting help from a charity that supports people into employment but says her “confidence has gone a little bit”.

“I’m trying to find something that can fit in with the part-time hours and also… I can kind of cope with,” she adds.

“I think the barriers are the anxiety of being out of work for so long and… the fear of the unknown.”

Trina Rodden – who works at the Shaw Trust that’s supporting Olivia – has seen a spike in the number of young people saying they’re unable to work due to mental ill health.

“I think there are a lot of factors,” says Ms Rodden.

“The pandemic has a lot to play. We’re kind of seeing the generation of young people that lived through those pandemic years. So often it can be low-level low self-esteem.

“They get to an age and they haven’t got that resilience, that ability to kind of self control and just get on,” she adds.

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With nine million people economically inactive, almost a third due to long-term sickness, the prime minister has said Labour inherited a country that isn’t working.

To put the £65bn a year cost of health and disability benefits in context, it’s more than double the UK’s annual policing budget.

The government is focusing on this issue because it knows it has to fix it in order to boost a sluggish economy.

And there’s another reason too. While millions of British people aren’t working, foreigners are filling jobs.

While that goes on it’ll be hard for the prime minister to confront another major issue – the need to cut immigration to a level that’s acceptable to voters.